Max M. Fisher, a self-made millionaire, never forgot this advice: "If you have the opportunity and the material means, you should give back to the community," he told The News in an interview two years ago. "You've got to give back."Max M. Fisher, 1908-2005
Max Fisher: A lifetime of power and passion
Kingmaker: He aided presidents, championed Israel, built an empire. Benefactor: Detroit's best friend poured his soul into city's revival.
"Max was a very, very wise man," says former Michigan Gov. John Engler, with Fisher at a 2002 fund-raiser. "And his energy was incredible."July 15, 1908: Born in Pittsburgh to immigrant Russian parents, raiaised in Salem, Ohio.
1930: Graduates from Ohio State University, where he played football on a scholarship, with a degree in business administration.
1933: Moves to Detroit and joins his father's oil reclamation business, earning $15 a week as a salesman. Later that year, forms his own gasoline company with two other men. Aurora Gasoline became one of the largest independent oil companies in the Midwest, with nearly 700 Speedway gas stations.
1934: Marries Sylvia Krell. They have one daughter, Jane.
June 1952: Sylvia Fisher dies in Detroit.
July 1, 1953: Marries Marjorie Switow. They have two daughters, Julie and Marjorie. Fisher adopts Marjorie's two children, Mary and Philip, from a previous marriage.
1954: Makes first visit to Israel.
1959: Retires as chairman of Aurora Gasoline after Marathon Oil Co. acquires the company. Fisher devotes more time, energy and money to Jewish and other philanthropic causes.
1963: Retires from business to spend most of his time on fund raising and philanthropy.
1967: As head of the United Jewish Appeal, orchestrates an international campaign to aid Israel after the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.
1970: After race riots devastate Detroit, co-founds Detroit Renaissance, a nonprofit business roundtable aimed at improving conditions in the city and region.
1975: President Ford and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger ask Fisher to help heal a diplomatic rift between the United States and Israel over relations with Egypt.
1993: Gives $20 million to Ohio State University to establish the Fisher College of Business.
Oct. 11, 2003: Max M. Fisher Music Center opens in Detroit. Fisher donated $10 million for the $60 million project.
March 3, 2005: Dies at his home in Franklin at age 96.
Sources: Detroit News research, Ohio State University, the Associated Press
Previous reports
Exclusive Report: Max Fisher on his Mission
Max Fisher is seen in 1969 with wife, Marjorie, and daughter Mary, one of two children he adopted from his wife's previous marriage.
Max M. Fisher, the son of Russian immigrants who scaled the heights of power in business, politics, and philanthropy, died Thursday at his home in Franklin at the age of 96.
A self-made millionaire with a common touch, Fisher was a confidant of presidents and prime ministers and a tireless supporter of the Republican Party, the international Jewish community, and the city of Detroit.
Fisher died about 11:30 a.m., surrounded by family. No cause of death was given. The news brought forth a flood of tributes from political, business and civic leaders who hailed Fisher as a paragon of generosity, honesty and true-blue American optimism.
"Max Fisher was a true and loyal friend," former President George H.W. Bush said in a statement. "He was a man whose advice I valued highly. I learned so much about leadership and just plain common decency from Max Fisher."
An oil tycoon who amassed a fortune estimated at $775 million, Fisher was an adviser to Republican presidents dating back to Dwight Eisenhower and an unofficial ambassador between the United States and Israel in Middle Eastern affairs.
But his accomplishments in business and politics seemed secondary to his heartfelt commitment to better the lives of others.
Fisher said he never forgot this advice from a friend: "If you have the opportunity and the material means, you should give back to the community," Fisher told The News in a 2003 interview. "You've got to give back."
Nowhere was his influence felt more than in his adopted hometown of Detroit, where Fisher left an indelible legacy on the skyline and soul of the city.
Fisher always led by example, whether it was rallying business leaders to invest downtown in the wake of the 1967 riots or contributing millions of dollars for a new performing arts center for the Detroit Symphony Orchestra.
"Today, Michigan and Detroit lost a great friend," Gov. Jennifer Granholm said. "Max Fisher had soaring optimism and soaring vision, and he lifted Detroit to new heights."
Both idealistic and pragmatic, Fisher embodied the small-town values and Horatio Alger-like spirit of early 20th-century America.
"Max liked to say that politics is the art of the possible," former Michigan Gov. John Engler said. "Well, with Max Fisher, anything was possible."
He was a behind-the-scenes diplomat in the Middle East during the Nixon and Ford administrations, and a peerless Republican fund-raiser of whom President Ronald Reagan once said: "Republican presidents inherit Max Fisher."
Fisher was credited in 1975 with smoothing tense relations between the United States and Israel, according to the memoirs of former Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin.
"He found a way to remain a Jewish leader and never betray the United States," Rabin wrote. "The door of the White House is always open to him and in time of need, Max moves its hinges."
But his stature in Washington and on the international stage never changed Fisher. His biographer, New York author Peter Golden, said Fisher had an extraordinary ability to relate to people from all walks of life with genuine compassion and interest.
"Whether he was talking to a little kid or the president of the United States, Max listened and he cared," Golden said.
And while his death was hardly unexpected, Fisher's legions of friends and admirers were devastated by the news.
"I'm not doing very well today," said real estate mogul A. Alfred Taubman. "I just lost my best friend, and so did Detroit."
Fisher was born July 15, 1908, in Pittsburgh, the first of four children of Russian Jewish parents who fled their homeland in pursuit of the American dream.
The family settled in Salem, Ohio, where Fisher was an average student, but an excellent athlete who earned a football scholarship to Ohio State University.
"I was insecure when I was a kid," Golden quoted Fisher as saying. "I was driven to be a success. I wanted to make my mark."
He moved to Detroit in 1933 during the Great Depression to work with his father in the family's oil reclamation business. While he started out as a $15-a-week salesman, Fisher soon founded his own company, Aurora Gasoline Co., with two partners.
Aurora grew into one of the nation's biggest independent oil companies, operating more than 700 Speedway discount gas stations across the Midwest. He hired Taubman, then a young real-estate developer, to build facilities that married gas pumps and service bays with convenience stores.
Fisher headed Aurora until 1959, when he sold the company to Marathon Oil Co. for a reported $40 million. He sealed the deal with a simple handshake, according to Golden's 1992 book, "Quiet Diplomat: A Biography of Max M. Fisher."
"That's the kind of person he was," Golden said. "If Max told you something, he did it."
As his business career flourished, Fisher began a lifelong devotion to Jewish causes. He visited Israel for the first time in 1954, and later chaired the United Jewish Appeal. His success as a fund-raiser led to his appointment three years later as the first Jewish chairman of the United Foundation's torch drive.
After retiring from the oil business, Fisher devoted himself to civic, political and philanthropic interests.
He quickly became an indispensable fund-raiser for Republican candidates and an adviser to President Nixon and then-Secretary of State Henry Kissinger.
But even as he moved easily into the corridors in Washington, Fisher never lost sight of his commitment to Detroit and southeastern Michigan. He bought the landmark Fisher Building -- named for the automotive-coach building family -- and devoted countless hours to local charities.
He would recall years later his horror at the riots that engulfed Detroit in the summer of 1967. Even as the city burned, Fisher was probing for the root causes of the racial tension that permeated the community.
He huddled with his close friend, Ford Motor Co. Chairman Henry Ford II, and urged him to wield the automaker's enormous influence on behalf of the city. Together, they established the civic group Detroit Renaissance, and spearheaded the development of the Renaissance Center office and hotel complex on the riverfront.
Fisher also became a close friend and supporter of Coleman Young, Detroit's first black mayor. At Young's urging, Fisher and Taubman built the Riverfront Apartments in an effort to jump-start development downtown.
"I said, 'Max, financially this is going to be a disaster,'" Taubman recalled. "He said, 'Look, we'll make it work. We've got to do it for the city.'"
While he built the Detroit development out of concern for the city and region, Fisher hadn't lost the entrepreneurial touch that made his fortune in the business world.
In 1977, he joined with Taubman and Henry Ford II to buy the 73,000-acre Irvine Ranch south of Los Angeles for the astronomical sum of $337 million. While the deal was ridiculed at the time by California real-estate experts, Fisher's group would sell the property six years later for an estimated $1 billion.
While Fisher's star rose in the political and business worlds, he never considered leaving Detroit for more glamorous spots like New York or L.A.
"People used to always say to Max, 'Max, why don't you move away from Detroit?'" said Ira Harris, a Wall Street executive and longtime friend. He'd say, 'Move away from my home?'"
He ventured into the spotlight only when necessary, preferring to work behind the scenes. President Ford once gave Fisher a memorable compliment when he said, "Max never called a press conference."
In his later years, Fisher poured his energies into charitable work for cultural and academic institutions. He donated $20 million to Ohio State University's College of Business, and gave $10 million toward the construction of the DSO's $60 million Max M. Fisher Music Center in downtown Detroit.
Upon the opening of "the Max" music hall in 2003, Fisher expounded upon his faith in the future of the city.
"Detroit needed a cultural base. That's something every community should have," he said. "Detroit was going downhill and downhill. It hit bottom, and now it's coming back."
His deeply felt optimism was at the core of Fisher's beliefs, Golden said.
"Max had those small-town American values that Norman Rockwell captured in his paintings," Golden said. "It was that belief in the future that was so prominent in the early 20th century, and he never lost it."
Many of those who knew Fisher considered him a mentor and an inspiration.
"Max was a very, very wise man," Engler said. "And his energy was incredible. There just aren't enough hours in the day to be a Max Fisher."
Even into his 90s, Fisher could be a powerful force in the boardroom.
"Fisher has a bear trap for a brain and smells B.S. a mile away," one Sotheby's board member told Fortune magazine in 2000. Fisher helped Sotheby's auction house settle a massive class-action suit alleging price-fixing. Taubman, who controlled Sotheby's, was convicted in 2002 in the scheme.
And Fisher never stopped giving counsel to new generations of political and business leaders.
Ford Motor Co. Chairman Bill Ford Jr. said Fisher provided insights and experience that no one else could when the Ford family planned a downtown stadium for the Detroit Lions.
"Every business leader in this area will miss his wisdom," Bill Ford said. "When he spoke in civic leadership meetings, it was amazing how the room would go quiet."
Detroit News Staff Writers R.J. King and Eric Mayne contributed to this report. You can reach Bill Vlasic at (313) 222-2152 or bvlasic@detnews.com.
Former Detroit Tigers manager Sparky Anderson signs a pennant for Max Fisher in 1993. Fisher left an indelible legacy on the Detroit skyline and soul of the city.
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